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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Jeremiah 3:1 - 3:1
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As a divorced woman who has become another man's wife cannot return to her first husband, so Judah, after it has turned away to other gods, will not be received again by Jahveh; especially since, in spite of all chastisement, it adheres to its evil ways. Jer 3:1. "He saith, If a man put away his wife, and she go from him, and become another man's, can he return to her again? would not such a land be polluted? and thou hast whored with many partners; and wouldst thou return to me? saith Jahveh. Jer 3:2. Lift up thine eyes unto the bare-topped hills and look, where hast thou not been lien with; on the ways thou sattest for them, like an Arab in the desert, and pollutedst the land by thy whoredoms and by thy wickedness. Jer 3:3. And the showers were withheld, and the latter rain came not; but thou hadst the forehead of an harlot woman, wouldst not be ashamed. Jer 3:4. Ay, and from this time forward thou criest to me, My father, the friend of my youth art thou. Jer 3:5. Will he always bear a grudge and keep it up for ever? Behold, thou speakest thus and dost wickedness and carriest it out." This section is a continuation of the preceding discourse in Jer 2, and forms the conclusion of it. That this is so may be seen from the fact that a new discourse, introduced by a heading of its own, begins with Jer 3:6. The substance of the fifth verse is further evidence in the same direction; for the rejection of Judah by God declared in that verse furnishes the suitable conclusion to the discourse in Jer 2, and briefly shows how the Lord will plead with the people that holds itself blameless (Jer 2:35).
(Note: The contrary assertion of Ew. and Nägelsb. that these verses do not belong to what precedes, but constitute the beginning of the next discourse (Jer 3-6), rests upon an erroneous view of the train of thought in this discourse. And such meagre support as it obtains involves a violation of usage in interpreting וְשֹׁוב as: yet turn again to me, and needs further the arbitrary critical assertion that the heading in Jer 3:6 : and Jahveh said to me in the days of Josiah, has been put by a copyist in the wrong place, and that it ought to stand before Jer 3:1. - Nor is there any reason for the assumption of J. D. Mich. and Graf, that at Jer 3:1 the text has been mutilated, and that by an oversight וַיְהִי has dropped out; and this assumption also contradicts the fact that Jer 3:1-5 can neither contain nor begin any new prophetic utterance.)
But it is somewhat singular to find the connection made by means of לֵאמֹר, which is not translated by the lxx or Syr., and is expressed by Jerome by vulgo dicitur. Ros. would make it, after Rashi, possem dicere, Rashi's opinion being that it stands for ישׁ לי לימר. In this shape the assumption can hardly be justified. It might be more readily supposed that the infinitive stood in the sense: it is to be said, one may say, it must be affirmed; but there is against this the objection that this use of the infinitive is never found at the beginning of a new train of thought. The only alternative is with Maur. and Hitz. to join לֵאמֹר with what precedes, and to make it dependent on the verb מָאַס in Jer 2:37 : Jahveh hath rejected those in whom thou trustest, so that thou shalt not prosper with them; for He says: As a wife, after she has been put away from her husband and has been joined to another, cannot be taken back again by her first husband, so art thou thrust away for thy whoredom. The rejection of Judah by God is not, indeed, declared expressis verbis in Jer 3:1-5, but is clearly enough contained there in substance. Besides, "the rejection of the people's sureties (Jer 2:37) involves that of the people too" (Hitz.). לֵאמֹר, indeed, is not universally used after verbis dicendi alone, but frequently stands after very various antecedent verbs, in which case it must be very variously expressed in English; e.g., in Jos 22:11 it comes after יִשְׁמְעוּ, they heard: as follows, or these words; in 2Sa 3:12 we have it twice, once after the words, he sent messengers to David to say, i.e., and cause them say to him, a second time in the sense of namely; in 1Sa 27:11 with the force of: for he said or thought. It is used here in a manner analogous to this: he announces to thee, makes known to thee. - The comparison with the divorced wife is suggested by the law in Deu 24:1-4. Here it is forbidden that a man shall take in marriage again his divorced wife after she has been married to another, even although she has been separated from her second husband, or even in the case of the death of the latter; and re-marriage of this kind is called an abomination before the Lord, a thing that makes the land sinful. The question, May he yet return to her? corresponds to the words of the law: her husband may not again (לָשׁוּב) take her to be his wife. The making of the land sinful is put by Jer. in stronger words: this land is polluted; making in this an allusion to Lev 18:25, Lev 18:27, where it is said of similar sins of the flesh that they pollute the land.
With "and thou hast whored" comes the application of this law to the people that had by its idolatry broken its marriage vows to its God. זָנָה is construed with the accus. as in Eze 16:28. רֵעִים, comrades in the sense of paramours; cf. Hos 3:1. רַבִּים, inasmuch as Israel or Judah had intrigued with the gods of many nations. וְשֹׁוב אֵלַי .snoi is infin. abs., and the clause is to be taken as a question: and is it to be supposed that thou mayest return to me? The question is marked only by the accent; cf. Ew. §328, a, and Gesen. §131, 4, b. Syr., Targ., Jerome, etc. have taken וְשֹׁוב as imperative: return again to me; but wrongly, since the continuity is destroyed. This argument is not answered by taking ו copul. adversatively with the sig. yet: it is on the contrary strengthened by this arbitrary interpretation. The call to return to God is incompatible with the reference in Jer 3:2 to the idolatry which is set before the eyes of the people to show it that God has cause to be wroth. "Look but to the bare-topped hills." שְׁפָיִם, bald hills and mountains (cf. Isa 41:18), were favoured spots for idolatrous worship; cf. Hos 4:13. When hast not thou let thyself be ravished? i.e., on all sides. For שֻׁגַּלְתְּ the Masoretes have here and everywhere substituted שֻׁכַּבְתְּ, see Deu 28:30; Zec 14:2, etc. The word is here used for spiritual ravishment by idolatry; here represented as spiritual fornication. Upon the roads thou sattest, like a prostitute, to entice the passers-by; cf. Gen 38:14; Pro 7:12. This figure corresponds in actual fact to the erection of idolatrous altars at the corners of the streets and at the gates: 2Ki 23:8; Eze 16:25. Like an Arab in the desert, i.e., a Bedouin, who lies in wait for travellers, to plunder them. The Bedouins were known to the ancients, cf. Diod. Sic. 2:48, Plin. Hist. Nat. vi. 28, precisely as they are represented to this day by travellers. - By this idolatrous course Israel desecrated the land. The plural form of the suffix with the singular זְנוּת is to be explained by the resemblance borne both in sound and meaning (an abstract) by the termination וּת to the plural וֹת; cf. Jer 3:8, Zep 3:20, and Ew. §259, b. רָעָתֵךְ refers to the moral enormities bound up with idolatry, e.g., the shedding of innocent blood, Jer 2:30, Jer 2:35. The shedding of blood is represented as defilement of the land in Num 35:33.